FAIRNESS (8 april 2004)
Ever heard of crocodile tears?
Crocodiles are reputed to shed tears when they devour their prey. Whether this story is true or not, the expression crocodile tears is often used when someone pretends a sorrow one doesn’t really feel, or creates a hypocritical show of emotion.
I remember how an ex-brother-in-law, who worked with a Dutch newspaper, told me how much it hurt him when he had to sack some redundant journalists.
This story came to mind when I recently heard about the way redundancy was solved at a school, where they had to cope with redundancy. Their reasoning was: if we only apply the last-in-first-out principle, we are going to lose a lot of valuable people. Besides, why should we sack a few people if it is possible to reduce the worktime of all? Applying these two principles, they did not have to sack anybody.
This appears to me a much fairer solution than sacking people and crying crocodile tears over it.
But fairness is a commodity that is sometimes hard to find in our society.
When the economic tide is low, companies tend to sack workers. But in the newspapers you must also have read that managers and other big shots just go on profiteering and cashing all kinds of bonuses.
Don't you also wonder why there is so little sense of fairness in our society? Or haven't you seen that people with the highest incomes are often the first to profiteer?
You might expect if there's one organization where fairness prevails it should be the courts of justice. Well ... forget it!
Some time ago, I had to appear in a court of law. But since I had no opportunity to be there, I wrote a letter in which I stated my point of view. I took it to the court and asked if I could get a receipt so I had proof I'd handed in a response.
"No need", was the answer. My letter would surely reach the judge, I could be assured of that! When the court session was there, the judge declared there had been no response from my side.
And you think the department of justice has to do with fairness and justice? Please act your age!
